Chapter 32 #2
When I admitted this, Jagger’s smile widened. He looked like he did years ago, when he’d handed me that blue rubber ball for my fourth birthday. The harbinger of my first death.
“Ah. I thought you weren’t as willing as you seemed.
I’m glad we decided to play this game. It makes me feel better to know my instincts were right.
Don’t tell Roumelade, but it reminds me of fishing.
It’s always more fun when the fish fights as you reel it in.
Who would mount a placid, docile fish on their wall?
No. It’s only a trophy if it resists. Although”—he stared at me as he dragged his knife across his arm—“don’t resist too long, or like Justice, you’ll find I’d rather cut the line. ”
As he drew the obsidian over his skin, a scalding pain dragged over my left arm. My skin parted, two lips opening, as blood ran free. His will clamped me tighter, the thick roots digging into my blood.
“It hurts me more than it hurts you,” Jagger said. “I’ll ask again. Do you want to save Justice from the Den of Depravity?”
How long, how often, had Jagger done this to Justice? Every time Jagger was hurt, his mines suffered the same fate. Every cut. Every bruise. Every broken bone.
“Is this hurting him?” I gasped. Was Justice feeling this too?
“No. Only you.”
I clamped my hand over my arm. “Then yes.”
Jagger cut off the tip of his pointer finger. I smothered a scream, and a thick wave of nausea rolled through me.
“And now?”
“Yes.”
It went on. And on. There were no windows in Jagger’s stone office. There was no clock. There was no way to mark the passage of time except through the amount of blood staining my clothing and pooling on the floor and the torrent of pain curdling in me.
“Do you want to save—”
“Yes,” I said, dropping to the stone floor, unable to stand any longer. My lips were numb, my eyelids heavy.
Jagger crouched over me. His will nearly swallowed me. The force of it caught me in its jaw, squeezing, clamping down. I was about to break.
He knew it. He could scent it. Unlike humans, leggerocks had no pain receptors.
Their blood moved slowly, like cold molasses.
They could withstand dozens of cuts, breaks, and wounds and be as unmoved as a cliff face in a windstorm.
Even more, they regenerated. Jagger healed quickly, and if he died, he came back.
Unlike me. I didn’t heal quickly. If I died this time around, I wouldn’t come back.
There was a wet rattle in my throat—a bloody cough.
“Mari. Mari . . . why are you hurting me? Why are you hurting yourself?”
His will pressed down on me. It hurt. It strangled. The roots of him broke apart my resistance.
“I can command you to say what I want. But I wanted to know your choice. It was a poor choice. I think you see that now. Don’t you?”
Jagger’s voice was faraway, almost soft. I’d never heard it soft before. I think maybe I was hallucinating.
My eyelashes felt as if weights were tied to them. My eyelids sank low, and the room darkened. The stone floor was cold against my cheek. My body hurt. Everything hurt. I’d receded, almost completely beyond pain.
“You fought. Not as long as my Knife, but your body is weaker than his. I think our game is done. Will you do my will without my asking? Will you leave Justice in the Den? I think that’s what you want.”
Blood trickled down my cheek, a slow tear.
I was drifting on the edge of unconsciousness.
Jagger’s will pressed through me, dragging me under.
I felt suddenly that his roots had reached my locked room.
They were prying at the lock, seeking cracks to pull apart.
The roots were sending shoots into the wall, and like ivy, they’d yank out the mortar and collapse the entire structure.
I was too weak to bat them away. I was too weak to shore up my heart.
If he tore open my room now, he’d devour it all. It would be gone. I would be gone.
I blinked up at him, clearing the darkness from my vision.
Did he know?
Could he feel it?
He smiled at me. It was a triumphant smile.
My mouth was numb as I struggled to push the words past my lips. “Your will . . .” My voice was a ravaged wasteland. “Your will is mine.”
It wasn’t enough. He laughed, his eyes cold. “That’s not what I asked. Do you want to save Justice from the Den?”
Lie.
Don’t lie.
Lie and save yourself.
Don’t lie and lose yourself.
Yet suddenly, it wasn’t a lie anymore. I couldn’t save Justice. If I fought Jagger more, I would lose everything good hidden inside me. If I fought more, I wouldn’t be able to save anyone. Not Luvic. Not Finn. Not Griff. Not Justice. No one.
This was what he’d been warning me about when I woke up.
This was what he’d known when he looked at me as the Den ripped him away. He’d known I wouldn’t save him. He’d known I’d sacrifice him. He’d known I’d choose to leave him and never come back.
He’d known.
“Mari? Do you want to go after Justice?”
I curled in on myself and pictured Justice painting me the illusion of our cabin in the north. I pictured his smile. Not the one from the Den of Depravity, but the one he’d had when he put his arm over my shoulder and tugged me close. His somber, steady, world-weary, I’ve-got-you-don’t-worry smile.
“No,” I said, letting Justice go. “I don’t.”
“I didn’t think so. But . . . why the change of heart?”
I pressed my hand to the cold floor, trying to cool the burning in my blood. “It isn’t worth it.”
Jagger laughed, gloriously, wondrously amused. The pressure inside me vanished. The seeking roots and the stabbing of his will disappeared.
I nearly passed out at the absence of the pressure.
Then he leaned close, a vial in his hand. The contents glimmered sunset-red with flecks of golden pearlescence.
“Drink.”
He held it to my mouth, and I swallowed the bitter, copper-tinged contents. Within seconds, my skin knitted together, my bruises faded, the tip of my pointer reformed; everything was made whole. The healing pain burned, and then, just as suddenly, it was gone.
I was left lightheaded and exhausted.
“What do you say?”
I licked my dry lips. “Thank you.”
Jagger stared, his flat gaze amused. “By the way, I thought you’d like to know, Justice did feel our game. He’s in excruciating pain. More than you were, in fact. Hopefully, the depraved don’t kill him while he’s helpless. Perhaps next time you won’t play so long?”
I made a desperate, wounded-animal noise, and Jagger’s smile grew.
His blood nipped at my pain.
“Hear my will. You won’t rescue Justice.
You won’t encourage anyone to rescue Justice.
If he returns, you won’t admit you wanted to rescue him.
If he asks, you will only tell him your final decision .
. . that he wasn’t worth it. In the meantime, as I’m out a Knife .
. .” He pressed his fingers together and sighed.
“I meant to send him after a branch of Clarks in Newark tonight. Make it look like the Smiths killed them, but also, perhaps, maybe, the Bards. We’re sowing seeds of doubt, Mari. Seeds of doubt.”
Would he make me do it? Would I become Jagger’s assassin?
“Send in Griff.”
No.
Not Griff. He’d never hurt anyone. Not ever. It would break him. It would . . .
Jagger smiled. “It’s time he learn, don’t you think?”
Jagger waited, maybe wondering if I wanted to play his game again. Leave Justice even more injured than he already was.
I pulled myself to my feet, walked past Gerald’s cold body, and slipped over the slick stone wet with my blood.
Before I left, Jagger called, “Tell Roumelade I want this room cleaned. And . . . Mari . . . tell Griff to hurry along.”
Hours later, long after Griff had flown from Hell Gate’s roof, I curled on my side, staring dry-eyed into the dark.
Justice’s room was just like mine. Bare walls.
Hard bed. No decorations. The only difference was that his sheets smelled like him, and his pillow had an imprint from where he’d laid his head.
I pulled my knees to my chest and breathed in his scent. How long would it take to fade? How long would it take him to fade?
“Justice,” I whispered. And then, silently, so the walls couldn’t hear, “I’m sorry.”
I fell asleep knowing that when I woke up, days, weeks, or months would’ve passed for him, and the Justice I knew would be long gone.
There was nothing I could do to save him.